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Iraq Invasion of Kuwait

The Invasion of Kuwait, also known as the Iraq-Kuwait War, was a major conflict between the Republic of Iraq and the State of Kuwait which resulted in the seven-month long Iraqi occupation of Kuwait which subsequently led to direct military intervention by United States-led forces in the Persian Gulf War.

In 1990 Iraq accused Kuwait of stealing Iraq's oil through slant drilling, but some Iraqi sources indicate Saddam Hussein’s decision to attack Kuwait was made only a few months before the actual invasion[3] suggesting that the regime was under feelings of severe time pressure. The invasion started on August 2, 1990, and within two days of intense combat, most of the Kuwaiti Armed Forces were either overrun by the Iraqi Republican Guard or escaped to neighboring Saudi Arabia and Bahrain.

Kuwait was a close ally of Iraq during the Iraq-Iran war and functioned as the country’s major port once Basra was shut down by the fighting.[4] However, after the war ended, the friendly relations between the two neighbouring Arab countries turned sour due to several economic and diplomatic reasons which finally culminated in an Iraqi invasion of Kuwait.

[edit] Dispute over the financial debtKuwait had heavily funded the 8 year long Iraqi war against Iran. By the time the war ended, Iraq was not in a financial position to repay the $40 billion which it had borrowed from Kuwait to finance its war.[5] Iraq argued that the war had prevented the rise of Iranian influence in the Arab World. However, Kuwait's reluctance to pardon the debt created strains in the relationship between the two Arab countries. During late 1989, several official meetings were held between the Kuwaiti and Iraqi leaders but they were unable to break the deadlock between the two.

[edit] Economic warfare and slant drilling
According to George Piro, the FBI interrogator who questioned Saddam Hussein after his capture, Iraq tried repaying its debts by raising the prices of oil through OPEC's oil...

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...By 1990, Iraq had spent eight years at war with Iran and was Â£50
billion in debt.
Explaining why Iraq invaded Kuwait, Tariq Aziz, the Iraqi foreign
minister said: "The leadership was focusing domestically on rebuilding
the country, those cities and towns that had been destroyed during the
warâ€¦ improving the standard of living for people in Iraq."
Iraq may have invaded Kuwait because of the oil policy pursued by
Kuwait. Kuwait was deliberately producing oil far beyond its OPEC
quota. This brought down the price of oil per barrel into the low $
teens. Iraq needed the price of oil to stay high per barrel because it
was vital to its recovery after the war it had just had with Iran.
Iraq tried to reverse this policy with the help of Saudi Arabia and
Egypt but to no avail. Each one-dollar drop in the price of oil cost
the Iraqi nation one billion dollars. So Iraq could claim that Kuwait
was waging an economic war upon Iraq. Iraq saw their invasion of
Kuwait as a defensive move, one to stop Iraq losing all its money from
the falling oil prices.
Iraq also considered Kuwait as a part of Iraq. After failing to invade
Iran, Saddam Hussein may have thought it would be easier to...

...Social studies notes
Chapter 1
The Invasion of Kuwait, also known as the Iraq-Kuwait War, was a major conflict between the Republic of Iraq and the State of Kuwait, which resulted in the seven-month long Iraqi occupation of Kuwait, which subsequently led to direct military intervention by United States-led forces in the Gulf War.
[edit] Dispute over the financial debt
Kuwait had heavily funded the 8 year long Iraqi war against Iran. By the time the war ended, Iraq was not in a financial position to repay the $14 billion it borrowed from Kuwait to finance its war.[6] Iraq argued that the war had prevented the rise of Iranian influence in the Arab World. However, Kuwait's reluctance to pardon the debt created strains in the relationship between the two Arab countries. During late 1989, several official meetings were held between the Kuwaiti and Iraqi leaders but they were unable to break the deadlock between the two.
[edit] Economic warfare and slant drilling
According to George Piro, the FBI interrogator who questioned Saddam Hussein after his capture (in 2003), Iraq tried repaying its debts by raising the prices of oil through OPEC's oil production cuts. However, Kuwait, a member of the OPEC, prevented a global increase in petroleum prices by increasing its own petroleum...

...On 2nd August 1990, Iraq launched an invasion of Kuwait, leading to a seven month occupation of Kuwait. The invasion was rebuked by the west as United States- led coalition forces pushed the Iraqi military out of Kuwait, resulting in the First Gulf War. Although the western world condemned Iraq for its occupation of Kuwait by accusing it of human rights violation and breaking International Law, historical evidence of the political and the socio- economic struggle between the two countries shows that Iraq’s raison d’etre in Kuwait was not an endeavor for power or a demonstration of its armies. Instead, this paper will argue that Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein’s motives were to free Iraq from the assumed ‘gratuitous debt’ which was procured during the Iran- Iraq war, to reconcile Kuwaiti theft of its oil through ‘slant drilling,’ and to proclaim land that Hussein believed rightfully belonged to Iraq. Although a tough predicament, the invasion was an impartial reconciliation path for Iraq and for Hussein, considering the factors leading to the strife between the two nations and to the escalading Iraqi apprehension
Although the U.S and its friends resented the Iraqi occupation of Kuwait, Iraq’s reasons were not unjustified. The question also arose that did the U.S have a...

...Did America invade Iraq simply for economical reasons? Or was it an act of imperialism? Was it an attack to retaliate the attacks on 9/11? There are numerous of reasons why America invaded Iraq. One can’t simply identify one single reason for why the war occurred. However, one can examine and debate whether one explanation has more significant importance than another. One can break the debate down to whether the invasion was a result of materialistic interests or by ideological reasons. There is a fair amount of dispute amongst people regarding the explanations for the war in Iraq. Some argue that the previous relations between the Iraqi regime and the US was already bad, and that after the 9/11 attacks U.S officials had a legitimate reason for going to war. On the other side a lot of people are convinced the war was a result of U.S national interest in gaining control over Iraq’s oil fields.
On the 20th of September 2001 president Bush declared war on terror. In congress president bush stated, “From this day forward, any nation that continues to harbor or support terrorism will be regarded by the United States as a hostile regime (Bush, 2001). The Bush administration further claimed that Saddam Hussein had developed weapons of mass destruction and feared that the regime would use such weapons towards the U.S and or towards Israel. Was America’s invasion of Iraq a consequence of the...

...﻿Political reasons for Iraq's war against Kuwait:
Saddam Hussein was the 5th president of Iraq. As such, his opinions become more than just conjectures but develop into political assertions. Thus, it can be said that his many "claims of madness" are Iraq's political statements.
Firstly, the Iraq-Kuwait dispute involved Iraqi political claims of Kuwait as Iraqi territory. Kuwait had been a part of the Ottoman Empire's province of Basra; something that Iraq claimed made it rightful Iraq territory; having been carved off as a result of British Imperialism Iraq did not recognise the independence of Kuwait in 1961, and views Kuwait as its 19th province.
Saddam Hussien believed that other countries, including the United States, Kuwait, Israel and other Arab countries were plotting against Iraq. Examples of this include economic sabotage by Kuwait raising its oil production, driving down oil prices. He also suspected the United States of conspiring with Kuwait to invade Iraq, as the US had conducted extensive military exercises with Kuwait.
Kuwait's rebellious nature of producing oil considerably above its mandatory OPEC quota prevented a further increase in crude oil prices, and the recovery of the war-torn economy of...

...America's invasion of Iraq
Introduction
Many things have been said and written about America's invasion of Iraq. To date, most of what have been said is essentially reactions leveled against the explanations adopted by the then America's regime and her allies in justifying invasion of Iraq. Bush's regime told the international community that there was urgent need to invade Iraq in order to oust Saddam Hussein's despotic leadership from power and thus pave way for the entrenchment of democracy in Iraq which is a prerequisite to international peace and security especially in this era of terrorism.
Even though UN Security Council's intelligence personnel assigned the responsibility of investigating America's claims of existence of WMDs in Iraq was not in harmony with those claims, America went ahead in engaging in one of the most expensive war since the end of Cold War. This essay seeks to establish whether sociopolitical explanations adopted by America amidst protests from the International community and the UN were underpinned by America's interest to maintain her global economic dominance or the proclaimed political motive of liberating Iraqis from tyranny.
War as a means of implementing foreign policy
Generally, war is a very expensive foreign policy implementation tool which no sane nation would want to frequently use not unless it's the only...

...﻿MW- 3 PART II
THE US INVASION OF IRAQ:AMERICAN WAY OF WAR AND THE DILEMMAS OF COUNTRY INSURGENCY
Q1. If the Saddam regime actually had possessed a substantial chemical and biological arsenal, would the American invasion of Iraq have been justified strategically? Explain why or why not Iraqi possession of such weapons would have threatened US vital security interests.
ANS. Iraq was in possession of Chemical Biological Weapons which it used against Iranians and also against Kurds in the 1980s.but at the same time Saddam’s forces never used chemical and/or biological weapons against Coalition troops. The reason can be that the intention of coalition forces was to liberate Kuwait and not to over throw Saddam or invade Iraq and using such weapons would have added more opposition against Saddam. If Iraq really had possessed a Chemical and Biological Weapons, probably its invasion would have not possible. If there were such weapons with Iraq and had it used those in the war and particularly against Israel, it would have been a big disaster not only for the region but for the whole world and the there would have been much different scenarios and would have been a mistake of the United States.
After Sep 2011 United States tried to establish connection between Iraq and terrorist but never proved it. Iraq as a state did not...

...United States invaded Iraq in 2003 we must first analyze the past these two countries have with each other. The United States has had heated relations with Iraq for some time now. It all started in 1979, when President Bakr resigned making the vice president Saddam Hussein president. It was under Hussein’s control in which most of the tension between the United States and Iraq was caused. Under the Carter administration the U.S. State department listed Iraq as a state that sponsors terrorism the same year Hussein came into power. This is when Iraq began its downward spiral. Whether is was capturing his own Iraqi people to use as dummies in chemical war fare testing or using chemical weapons in the Iraq-Iran war, someone had to step in and police Hussein’s rule.
Initially, the U.S. tried working with Iraq by establishing diplomatic relations. We were sending over billions and billions of dollars to help stabilize the country. I believe it was in the best U.S. interest to maintain good ties with Iraq because of the easy access Iraq has to oil. We even went as far as to side with Iraq during the Iraq-Iran war. After the Iraq-Iran war, the world banks were refusing to loan any more money to Iraq because they were still viewed an unstable country. They had no problem getting money out...